


Stewart's Coat

by Chash



Series: Miss Atomic Bomb [18]
Category: The Song of the Lioness - Tamora Pierce, Tortall - Tamora Pierce
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-21
Updated: 2014-11-21
Packaged: 2018-02-26 10:47:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,736
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2649197
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chash/pseuds/Chash
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>George Cooper has no official position in the Jonathan Conte presidency, but he still helps out.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Stewart's Coat

**Author's Note:**

  * For [goshemily](https://archiveofourown.org/users/goshemily/gifts).



> This takes place about twenty-five years after Miss Atomic Bomb proper.

As usual, George finds out Jon is visiting because Sabine shows up to secure the perimeter.

"It's eleven p.m. on a Tuesday," George says dryly. "There's no one here. You can tell him to come in."

Sabine flashes him a grin. "You know you don't actually have the authority to make that decision, right? Hey, George."

"Hey, beautiful. I didn't know he was coming, did I?"

She shakes her head. "No. It was pretty last-minute."

"Everything okay?"

"How should I know? _I'm_ not his secret adviser. I've given up on trying to read him." She sticks her head out and signals at her partner, and he and Jon come in. Sabine and her partner--Jim? Maybe Jim? He's a new one--set themselves up at the exits, and Jon sits at the bar.

"Mr. President," George says, straight-faced. "It's an honor."

Jon snorts. "It is not. Give me a drink."

"How hard do you want it?"

That gets him the smile he's been wanting. "Oh, you know me, baby." George pours him a double Hendricks on the rocks and slides it across the bar. "See, you do. You're the best."

"I'm sure there aren't any bartenders in DC who could learn your order. Gotta come all the way up here just to get a decent drink."

"Well, I keep trying to convince you to move down, but you're stubborn."

George yawns and cracks his jaw. "Maybe once the twins are in college," he says. "If you're still in office by then."

"How are the twins?"

"Good. Aly's in a play, she's hoping you'll be able to come. I already gave Raoul the dates, so don't think you're getting out of it. And Alan's playing football. He only expects you to come if they make it to state."

"Seems fair." He finishes his drink and looks at the glass like he's not sure if he wants another. George takes the glass and switches him to hot cider and rum; it's nippy out. "The best," says Jon, with another tired smile.

"I know. Did you bring my wife with you?"

"Like she'd let me come without her. She's visiting your mother so that we'll have some time alone before she claims you for time alone."

"Awfully thoughtful of her. So, why do we need time alone?"

"I don't know. I'm tired. It's been a long week, and it's only Wednesday. And I had a bad meeting. And Raoul is in Arizona talking to kids about loving themselves or something. Leader of the first world problems, uneasy is the head that wears the democratic equivalent of the crown, etc." He makes a face. "Patriotic necktie, maybe?"

"You wear a patriotic necktie on your head?"

"Only on special occasions." He sighs. "I'm not going to get reelected."

"You're not?"

"Everyone says I'm a shoo-in!"

"Ah," says George. "Yeah. I can see how that'd have you worried."

Jon glares. "Everyone--literally everyone--told me I wasn't going to get elected the first time. Strangers on the street told me I wouldn't be elected. They said I was too young and too gay to ever be elected, and then I got in fights with them about bisexual erasure and how important it is to recognize that bisexual people in committed relationships are still bisexual and then I'd break out the Kinsey scale and I just assumed no one would vote for me after that. My campaign slogan was _Do it for the Vine_ , George. Vine doesn't even exist anymore! College students thought I was really into environmental activism."

"You lost me somewhere in there," George says dryly. "What's the problem again?"

"So, no one thought I would get elected last time. Why should I believe them that I will this time?"

"Because you're wildly popular and everyone thinks you're doing a great job? Except the far right, but there aren't enough of them to get you out. Your approval ratings are through the roof."

"And then if I do get reelected, what then?"

"Then you're president."

"Just for four more years! And then what? I'm not president anymore and someone else fucks up the country without me. Do you think I could get elected as dictator for life? Or maybe not _life_. But, like, I dunno. I'm president until Alanna tells me to stop. I bet I could get people to agree to that."

"So, you stopped thinking you won't get elected again, and now you're thinking you can convince the voters to overturn--it's an amendment, right?"

"Probably," says Jon, waving his hand. "How am I supposed to know?"

"Yeah, you're right. I have no idea why the President of the United States would be familiar with the Constitution."

Jon squints at him. "Did you get meaner while I was gone?"

"Nah. You're just used to people kissing your ass."

He snorts. "You know how many people tweet hate at me every day?"

"Well, that's what you get for maintaining your own Twitter account. And keeping a Twitter account. Not as popular as you thought?"

"It's mostly people telling me I'm going to hell for marrying Raoul. Kids these days aren't into Twitter, so it's just me and the old homophobes." He shakes his head. "You know, if you told me when I was twenty that the reason I'd be getting hate as the president was because I married Raoul, I would have said you were nuts."

"So, when you were twenty you expected you'd be president, you just figured you'd be getting hate for a different reason?"

"Yeah, like my super liberal views or public drunkenness or something. I didn't think I'd be married at all. Probably on my third divorce."

When George was twenty, he wasn't sure he'd live to see his thirtieth birthday, let alone his fiftieth. He hadn't been sure he'd survive that year, with everything else that had been happening. He certainly wouldn't have believed he'd be on the other side of fifty, still at the Dove, married with two kids, friends with the President of the United States.

"What?" asks Jon.

"Just thinking." He gives Jon a water and another hot cider. "You're good at what you do, you know."

"I do know. That's why I want to be dictator for life. What am I going to do if I stop being president?"

"You'll come back here and do good here. Or you'll go back to the senate or to congress or go and form your own new country where you can be dictator for life. Nothing's going to stop you working for your people, Jon. We all know that."

Jon gives him a watery smile. "See, that's why I came back."

"Alanna would have told you that too."

"Alanna and I got drunk and threw darts at a dartboard she made with republican congressmen's faces on it. You're both helpful in different ways."

"Oh good, as long as I'm not useless." The bell jangles as Alanna pushes the door open, shaking the snow out of her hair. It's been less than two weeks since he last saw her, but he still misses her every time she's gone. She's a great Secretary of Education, she does important work, he'd never want anything else for her, but he hates having her so far away.

"Hey, darlin'," he says, smiling.

"So, now is when I leave so you can have sex?" Jon asks, sounding morose.

Alanna sits down next to Jon and puts her arm around him, giving him a squeeze. "Nah, not yet. George isn't closing for a while, right? And we can't have sex until he closes."

"I'm sure we could find a way," says George, leaning in to kiss her. "How were Ma and Myles?"

"Good. Ma says you don't visit enough and you're not eating right."

He rolls his eyes. "So, business as usual. I'm telling Jon he's going to be reelected, and his life won't end when he stops being president."

"I thought we were still on the dictator-for-life plan."

"George doesn't seem to think it's realistic."

Alanna grins at him. "Way to not be supportive, George."

"I know, I'm awful. How long are you staying?"

"Jon's going back tomorrow. I'm going to stay through the weekend. Spend some time with you, see the twins."

"I guess it'll be cool to not be president so I can do whatever I want again," Jon says, sighing. "I want to take half a week off and have sex with my husband too."

Alanna ruffles his hair. "Do you want to come up and sleep on our couch like the old days? Will that help?"

"Can we watch CSPAN and play the republican hairpiece drinking game?"

"Of course we can." She kisses him on the cheek. "Go upstairs, I'll meet you in a minute."

"George is a minute man, huh?" he asks, waggling his eyebrows. Alanna shoves his shoulder, and he heads upstairs with Sabine and his other secret security agent. 

She comes behind the bar and gives him a much longer kiss. "You're quiet," she murmurs. "Everything okay? Did Jon upset you with world problems again?"

"Nah." He smiles, pushing her hair back behind her ears. She's going gray at the temples. "He just got me thinking. Your life ever feel surreal?"

"All the time."

"The President of the United States flies up from Washington just to visit me and get my advice. How did that happen? When I was a kid I figured I'd be in jail or dead by now."

That makes her frown. "Well, I'm glad you're not."

"Me too. Not something I've worried about for a while. Just always surprises me that Jon's the one who knew exactly where his life was going, I guess. And that all of us knew it too. I never doubted he'd be president someday, and I once found him passed out in my dumpster."

Alanna laughs. "Only once?"

"Well, I figure the other times he woke up before I found him."

"Seems likely."

"Is it bad that I'd vote for him as dictator until you told him he was senile?"

"No, I would too. Gary's looking into it."

"Of course he is." He leans down and kisses her again. "Go take care of our boy, okay?"

"I believe Alan is our boy. Jon is older than I am. And the President."

"Still our boy," George says.

Alanna smiles. "Yeah, okay. Still our boy."

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[Podfic of] Stewart's Coat](https://archiveofourown.org/works/4798370) by [knight_tracer](https://archiveofourown.org/users/knight_tracer/pseuds/knight_tracer)




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